Adrian Monck – City University London

Posted on 05. Oct, 2007 by David Cohn in International

Your work in networked/citizen/collaborative journalism.

I run City University (London)’s journalism education programme, the UK’s biggest, with over 220 journalism postgrads.

We have two projects that might be of interest:

A doctoral collaboration with Sky News developing a group of citizen correspondents.

Maintaining and developing a database of FOI requests in association with MySociety – allowing the public to track their own FOI requests

What are your goals?
To look at how participation works in practice on a real issue like a general election – problems, successes, lessons for the future. Obviously we are really, really hoping Gordon Brown doesn’t call a snap election…but I have a feeling he will.

Also to upskill journalists and get them thinking about new ways to leverage and even organize the people they serve. We are a not-for-profit, so we are excited that the industry is moving in our direction (just kidding).

Notable achievments

We’ve always done a kind of networked journalism. We run a small radio station involving residents from deprived local communities as programme makers and participants, so the idea of expanding involvement in journalism is nothing new. What is new are the tools that take the geography out of that networked participation, like wikis.

Lesson you’ve learned (including mistakes you’ve made)
Connoisseurship is a huge mistake. As professionals we develop a whole range of tastes that are irrelevant and indulgent. They are the things, ironically, that give US a sense of community. We need to find a way of keeping them without forcing them on the audience.

Participation is onerous. Not for nothing do democracies only require it at long intervals.

Money and the future?
If I knew the second, I’d be making the first.

Looking forward to hearing from people with a clearer view of the above than I have, which includes you Dave!